America is in danger of experiencing an academic brain drain
America is in danger of experiencing an academic brain drain
Other countries may benefit. Science will suffer
“I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness...
The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance” ― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark(1995)
Wow. Completely nailed it, unfortunately.
Do you also start to get weary of how they're always dead-on when it comes to pessimistic predictions? :(
I mean there are a few good actuate positive predictions. The family of laws that collectively are called Moore's law is decent offhand example.
Fuck.
Idiocracy had their time predictions wrong, it's already nearly there.
The most ludicrous part of Idiocracy is that the film makers thought the future it depicted would be 500 years away. Turns out, it was 20 years.
That's what I said
There's no way I'd send my kids to Harvard or MIT (or Stanford, Caltech, Yale, Princeton, etc. etc.) if I were a foreigner. Shit, I am an American and I think I'd probably prefer to send my kids to McGill at this point. I hope my outlook changes. And I write this as someone who has walked the halls of two of those prestigious universities.
It's part of the plan. If you can't win over the more left-leaning academia, you can always just get rid of it. Worked out for both Hungary and Russia.
"in danger"
Why is it that all these articles seem to be written in the past?
Brain drain? They're flushing them!
Brain Cistern
Unironically I would be literally thrilled to contribute to this brain drain. I'd drop everything and get on a plane right this very second for a chance to do a PhD in literally any other country.
If anyone is looking to fill a electrical engineering PhD position literally anywhere but America then I'm ya boy.
These are places I would consider if I were able to go back to school:
- https://www.eng.mcmaster.ca/ece/degree-options/electrical-and-computer-engineering-phd/
- https://grad.uwo.ca/admissions/programs/program.cfm?p=41
- https://uwaterloo.ca/electrical-computer-engineering/doctor-philosophy-phd
- https://www.mcgill.ca/gradapplicants/program/electrical-engineering-phd
- https://www.sgs.utoronto.ca/programs/electrical-and-computer-engineering/
Yeah, we gonna need loads of that for 7th gen fighters, resilient next-gen green smart grids, etc. Bon voyage!
PS: we're not better than the US, but at least our political systems can delay full fascist takeover for about 5-20 years...which may be enough time to reverse it politically or to at least create defenses against it.
Thank you for this. I couldn't find this for some reason.
So I am in no position to help you but I do have a very strange and hypothetical (ish) question:
How feasible would it be to hack a monitors firmware and use it to send and receive data, assuming that the data being sent is encoded on, say, the green color channel of said monitor and you had an sdr or some specially configured device set up somewhere to help make this very specific and bizarre idea work?
I think at this point, the danger has crystallized pretty thoroughly. Even if you somehow stopped everything that was currently happening, I don’t really know why anybody would want to come here anymore for university. Getting a degree is already stressful enough without having to worry about whether or not the institution will legally be allowed to keep you enrolled for the entire duration of your program.
and the job markets in the us are pretty unstable as it is, especially lot of biotech is preferentially hiring H1B visa holders anyways over citizens, if you dont have a Doctorates.
the problems at the BS/MS level is the low amount of lab experience that is given to students, and universities make it very hard to get them in general.
I don’t really know why anybody would want to come here anymore for university
I mean if my advisor can secure the funding, the two reasons I plan on doing my PhD in America are (1) I like my advisor and (2) I went to school here and I don't like my chances of being accepted somewhere else. Like I would rather do a PhD in literally any other country.
Of course. We have people in government who don't believe in germ theory. Education is extremely expensive, and if you don't pick a "Good" major, not only are you in debt, but shamed and mocked for it, since no one "forced" you to go. Jobs that require these degrees, even doctors, are not paying enough for people to live, study, and afford food. Why would you stay?
Also educated people tend to vocally disagree with fascists, so obviously fascists wants fewer of them around.
College educated skilled worker. I already left. I'm not looking back. Thanks Trump for making me realize how much the US was holding me back
Yuuup. Trump getting elected once was the writing on the wall, I wasn't going to wait and hope he didn't manage to return to power. Turns out that was a great decision, the Netherlands are amazing.
I do sure love it when cowards leave the country instead of remaining here to vote in their interest. To everybody patting themselves on the back for leaving America, you’re part of the fucking problem
Clearly I'd be more helpful in El Salvador
Any particular resources you found helpful in your move? My main concern is how to make the visa work and how to find a livable wage abroad
Not OP, but I did the same, when I first realized the US was on a slippery slope towards idiocracy (and, in fairness, I realized it three decades after many intellectuals already warned about it). In my case, I was fortunate to work for a multinational, which agreed to transfer me to a country within the EU, and to take care of the paperwork. Over a decade later, I have citizenship here, my own house, and I feel fully integrated into the local society. And I don't need to worry about college tuition for my kids. They'll have a choice of free education anywhere within the EU, and by the time they're old enough, they may have access to a wide variety of educators who left he US.
Getting a work/student visa takes a lot of time so start it early. It's generally easiest to get PR through work or study.
But it's only one piece of the puzzle. My partner and I spent 2 months before we moved going through everything we own and deciding what to get rid of. We got rid of about half of our stuff, anything you don't get rid of will have to go through customs, not to mention figuring out how to physically move your stuff.
Once you get to a new place, setting up is also its own logistical nightmare. You won't have any credit established so getting an apartment or credit card might be difficult to start. You also need a bank account, which might have its own requirements.
And then there's the social part of it. I'm lucky that my community is international and I was very quickly able to find my people, but if you don't know anyone you're going to be very lonely until you do. Try to make some friends before you move.
Where did ya go?
If more of you cowards can run away that would be great. Make room for those that will fight, but please dont come back when we the people rip it all down.
smart people leave and fight another day, dumb ones stay and become either fodder, or become "Slaughtered by the regime". especially people in the sciences will improve other sectors in other countries that USA will never have again. the only ones that fight, is if they get trapped and unable to move abroad. i know you're a troll like on reddit, but this how its always been, look at ww2 poland, germany,,,etc.
You don't need to be in the USA to fight.
The fight was won by Russian troll farms operating in Iran. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html
Unless you're a true sociopath ready to take advantage of the situation, past a certain threshold of intelligence and knowledge being surrounded by MAGAmericans and propaganda aimed at them, and knowing your country can only get worse, must feel like torture.
It is. MAGA support just feels like insanity. Trying to discuss things with them about their reasoning is excruciating. I avoid people who I know are MAGA for the most part now. It’s just a black hole of demoralizing energy to try to break through their bubble.
Anyone with the brains and means is welcome in EU! Several member nations are setting up funds for exactly this reason.
But are we though? Because based on my research, it's a lot harder to get into the EU than it used to be like 10 years ago. It's not as if anti-immigration sentiment isn't picking up there either.
not if you have a PHD, or a MD in some specialty, they always in need of those. but to "immigrate" normally it might be more difficult unless you are rich.
Anyone with the brains is doing everything in their power to get out ASAP unless they're nearing retirement, have elderly parents or close relatives, etc.
You cannot do legitimate science under fascist or fundamentalist governance. Too much of reality is considered wrongthink.
I am not going to miss the "pax" Americana, but it's sad seeing this and knowing that the world's total rate of scientific advancement will go down considerably for at least a decade.
Does it count as being in danger if it's the ultimate goal?
Come on, who in their right mind would leave the American academic environment? You can say whatever you want, but universities in America are the best in the world.
thats not true anymore, several universities already have been sanctioned by trump either through cutting funding, or anyone that expressed pro-palestinian views. as others have said you cant really be a scientist in a oppressive enviroment, when even your motives a scientist could be questioned as enemy of the state.
This is the THIRD time the Republicans have cancelled funding to my research projects over the course of 15 years. This country isn't conducive to stable research work.
The projects cancelled were on senior care tech with smart homes, augmented reality to help prevent falls, and air quality feedback to help people during wildfire seasons. No exactly hotbeds of controversial topics, but having my career and livelihood jerked around against and again by these assholes is enough for me to go. The lastest bend to fascism was just the nail in the coffin.
Tell that to the hundreds of researchers who have their entire research programs and funding prospects thrown into the air, and/or outright cancelled.
Used to be the best in the world.
i believe this is because american universities have access to the most resources with which to perform expensive, difficult, but rewarding research. Those resources are now being stripped away. If another country is willing to supply the necessary resources for expensive research then researchers will go there. Source - am scientist.
Nope. Or at least not necessarily.
The ranking that generally gets cited to that end judges universities by research output, which is generally not what you're looking for when you're looking for a good education -- you want a university that's good at teaching, not good at producing papers and citations. You want a professor that's not busy producing papers, because they were hired to produce papers, you want one that actually teaches.
It's also slanted heavily in favour of Anglo countries when it comes to looking at the "producing papers" metric alone: Pretty much all other countries produce the bulk of their papers at research institutes, which don't show up in the list because they're not universities. If they were included IIRC Max Planck would top the list. Granted, that's also to a large degree because they're absolutely massive, a large number of institutes under a common roof.
The citations metric is also slanted, because pretty much all countries will cite english papers regardless of the language of the paper being written, but all non anglo countries also produce a significant part of papers in the local language, which are much less likely to get cited.